A Gift of Lace and some freebies

Hello friends, hope you are all well. I have not posted for a while because I have had computer issues, also I have been busy creating projects for design teams, but today I have a fun project to share, - an altered file folder, so here goes:

The folder is made from a manilla coloured file folder, and I used Prima Lavender papers to decorate it through out.

The front is decorated with some home made flowers, lace and a couple of little charms attached to the ribbon that closes it.

I also used some of the gorgeous Prima Lavender Washi tapes through out to decorate it.

On the inside there are pockets, and each pocket holds a lace bobbin/spool or whatever you want to call it, because this is for a friend who loves lace.

Here is the second page with further lace spools, each type of lace is slightly different.
I made the spools myself by printing some freebies I made a number of years back on card. I fussy-cut them and then added the lace from my stash.

As I thought some of you might like to do something similar (it's a great way to store your laces), - I will post the freebies below here again too. I think they were the most popular freebies I ever posted, so if you have not seen them before, here they are:

They print on A4 or 8.5/11 paper, but in case you want to print them individually, let me know and I can sent you the individual high res files. Here is one example:

I noticed that the Funkie Junkie Challenge blog is running a  layers of lace challenge right now, so I am going to link this there. And if you are interested how to make a file folder like this yourself, - there are many tutorials on youtube and in a few weeks time I will have a full tutorial of a different style folder as well.

Well, that's it for now, - many thanks for your visit like always and happy crafting!

xxxxx

A gift and some transparency

Hello friends, - today I want to share a little canvas I made for a friend I visited today and whose birthday it was recently.

I love drawing sweet little faces, but this one was a bit of a struggle, because I had created a rather textured background first.

Said background was created on a piece of thick card with the help of acrylic paints, gesso, a brayer and some stencils, - just playing around and having fun.

Here you can see some of the textures and some background stamping which I usually add to this type of background.

I also added a couple of little fussycut butterflies for a little more interest and then I adhered the piece to a prepared canvas that I had coloured with a mix of Distress paints and crayons.

To give the edge of the cnavas a little more interest I added some strips of washi design tape and that was pretty much it.

Now you may wonder, what about the transparency...? Well I am sure most of you will be aware that Europe is implementing  the new General Data Protection Regulations (GDPR) which come into action on May 25th. It is somewhat unclear  whether individual bloggers are part of the deal. To be on the safe side, this bit is to let you know that I have created a Privacy Policy which you can see at the relevant page just under the header of my blog.

The data held by Blogger is very limited, and I assure you I do not and never will use your data for anything but sending you notification of a new blogpost, or for clicking through to your blog for a return visit. As stated in the Privacy Policy, all Blogger blogs use cookies, and these can be disabled in your internet settings if you choose.

If you are a follower by email or via bloglovin, you are of course entitled to unsubscribe at any time of your choosing, but I very much hope you will continue to follow my crafting journey here at Astrids Artistic Efforts.

Okay, boring business over, and like always, thanks for you visit and have a wonderful week!

xxxxx

More Tim Journaling

Hello lovely visitors, today I have another journal spread to share, again using mostly Tim Holtz products.

I am having great fun using some of my hoarded Tim stash and playing with Distress Paints, Crayons and Inks.

The background was created by adhering some Collage paper across both pages using mat gel medium and once dry painting over it with Antique Linen and  Pumice Stone Distress paint. I stencilled with some heavy gesso to lighten it here and there and then deepened the colour in certain places using Distress Crayons.

Strips of washi tape and ephemera were added and some background stamping in various places.

 Here I used the numeric layering stencil and Distress Crayon to stencils, I love how when you rub the crayon through the stencil with your finger it actually adds dimenion.

The focal point became this sweet little girl from Paperwhimsy, I gave her the flowers to hold as if she is gathering them in her special garden.

Well, that's pretty much it. We are still having the most wonderful sunny Spring weather even though it is coolish, but that suits me just fine.

Hope you are all having a good week and thanks for your visit like always.

xxxxx

Steampunk travel, a mid month project for Mixed Media Monthly

Hello friends, thanks for dropping by. Today I am sharing another "rusty" project for Mixed Media Monthly, where as many of you will know, our theme is rust this month and the challenge is sponsored by Emerald Creek, who sent each of us designers some of Seth Apter's wonderful baked textures.

When I started my project, I had no idea where it was going other than that it would include something rusty and I would use my Baked Textures. So I started by rusting up some elements.

The cogs were little chipboard pieces, I covered them with embossing ink, gave them a coat of the Rust powder and then a few sprinkles of Patina Oxide powder.
The large 3 was stamped with a Tim Holtz Numerical stamp,  fussy cut and then embossed with a mixture of first Rust, then Rocky Road, more Rust and finally a little Patina Oxide powders. I wished you could see it in real life, it really looks  like rusted and oxidised metal, - these powders are totally magical.
Anyway, back to my project:

I took a piece of Tim Holtz packaging, rounded a couple of the corners, added a bit of stencilling using Vintage Linen Distress paint, stamped a La Blanche stamp in the center and added some strips of washi and ephemera pieces. I then stamped all round the edges with another La Blanche steampunk type stamp.

Next I took one of the Ideaology Vignette frames, painted it black and then highlighted with Copper Treasure Gold. I arranged the cogs and number under and around the frame and added the word Travel to finish it all off.

The word is a Tim Holtz word sticker, matted on black card and again highlighted with Copper Treasure gold.

It's not often I create masculine projects, but this will come in useful when I need a male card or tag.

Don't forget, you still have two weeks to join in our challenge and if you add our graphic below, you could even be in with a chance to with some of the wonderful Baked Textures!

Thank you for your visit like always and I hope you will have some creative time!!

xxxxx

There is beauty in simplicity

Hello friends, lovely to see you come by here!
Today I have another journal spread to share:

I set myself the challenge to only use Tim Holtz products for this spread and had good fun digging out some of my newer and older Tim stash.

For the backgrounds I used two matching Vintage Wallpaper papers. (There are two of each design in the pack, in case you have not yet seen them). For some reason I seem to be attracted to pink right at the moment, which is weird as normally I don't really do pink, maybe it's because of all the blossoms outside.

For the left side, I just inked the paper a little, using Hickory Smoke Oxide and Normal Distress inks. I love how the Oxide version has almost a smokey pinky purple undertone, wile the normal DI is much more grey.

Next came the tag, again coloured with a mix of Oxide and Normal DIs, this time using Hickory Smoke and Denim inks. After some spritzing I used texture paste and the small rose layering stencil, coloured with Distress Markers once it was dry and then finished both the tag and the background with stamping, remnant rubs, a paper doll and some strips of Design Tape from the remnants set (my current favourites.

For the right hand page the wallpaper was altered quite a bit more. I used gesso to stencil with the Lattice stencils. I chose that one because it echos the design of the wallpaper a bit and also is my all time favourite of the layering stencils.
Next I used Hickory Smoke and Victorian Velvet DIs to do some inking and then a baby wipe for some further subtle stencilling, as it lifts some of the ink.

I then stamped right around the edges with Archival ink using the Etc stampset. (This is an idea I picked up from the ever so talented Vicky Papaioannou). I love how it frames the page.

This page was embellished with some butterflies from the Flutter set. First I stamped them directly onto the page using the stamp platform, and then again on card. I stamped in Hickory Smoke Oxide, clear embossed and then coloured with more of the same inks. I wished now I had not done that as it made the stamping rather fuzzy somehow, ah well, live and learn...

Finally I finished with some more washi tapes and a sentiment, stamped in the same way.

Some white splatters, done with some diluted white paint and a small brush, finished it all off.

I adhered both pages into my journal after I had irst inked around all the edges with more Hickory Smoke Ink.

Well, there you have it, another journal spread. As it includes both flowers and butterflies, I thought I would add this spread to the Art Journal Journey blog, where my lovely friend Jo is hosting the latest challenge which is Flora And Fauna.

Thank you for your visit like always and enjoy the weekend when it comes!

xxxxx

Just playing, - mixed media journal page

Hello friends, hope you were able to enjoy some fun time this weekend. Here in Scotland we had some glorious sunshine and I spent most of the weekend outside. But on Friday I had great fun playing in my journal, and here is the result:

I decided to try out some of my new stash and as I was too much involved in the process, I forgot to take any step out photos, but will talk you briefly through what I did.

I started by gathering various collage papers, paper serviettes, torn book pages and some scraps of the ideaology worn wall papers. I added them to my pages with fluid matte medium and then added some journalling using a biro with the plan to just have it there as a layer and cover it mostly with gesso, jsy peeping through here and there... BIG MISTAKE!! No matter how many coats of gesso and paint I threw at it, it kept coming through. So in the end I had to add more papers and some of the new Seth Apter baked textures, the Vintage Beeswax one, stamping into it while still hot.

I stamped into it while it was still hot and also added further background stamping, using Seth Apter and AAL &Create stamps.

I added some of Tim's new Washi tape from the Remnants set, which matches the worn wall paper scraps I chose in colour rather well, and added further patches of colour using Paper Artsy paints and Distress Crayon, as well as some dark brown Gelato arround the edges.

The spread was becoming rather busy so I added a paper doll with some butterfly wings to act as a focal point and draw in the eye a bit.

And finished with a couple of sentiments, one stamped in black and the other white embossed on black card, both from the AAL&C stamp set and some splatters finished it all off.

Well that's it for today. Thanks so much for your visit and I hope you'll get some fun playtime this week.

Have a good one!

xxxxx